Always On My Mind
by tvaddict23
Summary: Sofia steps up to the plate for Grissom and Sara COMPLETE
1. Default Chapter

DISCLAIMER – Not mine. Belong to Anthony Zuiker, et al, CBS and Alliance Atlantis.

A/N - This story is a sequel to **From the Inside**. So it'll make more sense if you read that first.

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Grissom finally returned to his office at 11.30. He'd pulled a double going over a triple homicide, going over the crime scene getting every bit of evidence possible. Opening the door, he saw a piece of paper on the desk. It had the official LVPD/CSI letterhead and save for three lines, was blank.

His heart froze in his chest. Almost instinctively he knew what it was. He had to force himself to walk the two yards to his desk. With a trembling hand he picked up the paper.

_To Dr Gil Grissom,_

_As of the above date, I resign._

_Sara Sidle CSI 3_

No explanations, no apologies. She was simply gone. He saw the document sized envelope next. He opened it and upended it onto his desk. It had contained her badge, cell phone, lab ID and the keys to her locker. He picked up the ID. The young woman smiling out at him looked so happy and confident.

Thinking back, he wasn't able to come up with a single time in the past two years when she'd looked that content. The last time he'd seen her was the previous night when he'd handed her her assignment, before leaving for his triple homicide.

An old song came to mind. Elvis Presley's "You Were Always On My Mind". And she was. Now as he looked at the note in his hands, the words of the song were all the more meaningful. "_Maybe I didn't treat you…Quite as good as I should have…Maybe I didn't love you…Quite as often as I could have…Little things I should have said and done…I just never took the time". _

Taking her keys from his desk, he hurried to the locker room. His hands were still shaking as he unlocked and opened the door to her locker. All her personal effects were gone. The only things left were her flack-jacket, bulletproof vest and overalls.

Fishing out his cell, he punched her speed dial number. He let the connection ring out before pushing the End button on the cell.

He took out his keys, and rushed from the building, paperwork all but forgotten.

Driving like a madman, he pushed his Denali to the limit getting to her apartment, though he knew deep down that she wouldn't be there.

Pulling up to the complex, he saw a moving van out the front. Racing to her apartment he saw two burly men man-handling a sofa through the door. A little breathless he asked, "Where is all this stuff being taken?"

"Local Red Cross."

Suspiciously he asked, "All of it?"

The other guy nodded, "Yeah, I guess she got married and decided she didn't want none of her stuff no more."

Nodding absentmindedly Grissom walked slowly back to his truck. Sitting behind the wheel he thought, '_Not married. Leaving everything behind, to start again. Away from him.'_

Driving back to the lab, he thought back on the many things he could have done differently. The top of his list was at least admitting to her face that ye, he did have romantic feelings toward her. Yes, he was afraid, but he'd work on it, THEY'D work on it together. Pulling up at the lab, he knew he needed to inform Ecklie of what had happened. Damn, he really couldn't stand that guy.

With resolute steps he made his way through the corridors to the supervisors office. Unsurprisingly Catherine was there having a very animated conversation with the little worm.

Knocking politely he entered at the curt nod. Catherine rose to leave. "No stay, you need to hear this too."

Surprise flashed across her face as she re-took her seat.

'_No use beating around the bush,"_ he thought, so he simply stated. "We need to find a replacement for Sara Sidle. As of this morning, she has resigned her position at this lab."

Having said what he needed to, Grissom walked from the room and back to his office.

Catherine and Ecklie sat in stunned silence. After a short while, a smile spread across Ecklie's face. "Well, that ended up being much easier than I thought."

Catherine looked sharply at him. "What do you mean?"

The smile grew wider and somewhat shark like. "Firstly, I had already contacted a level 2CSI from Colorado, when I suspended her for insubordination. I had hoped that Grissom would have done the right thing and fired her, but he didn't. The guy I contacted is still interested, so I'll be letting him know that he can move to Vegas, and start ASAP."

Still staring, her disbelief growing she asked, "You knew?"

"Sure," he said now almost laughing. "I had to okay her résumé, plus which there have been quite a few calls from labs across the country, asking about her."

"Why didn't you say anything?" her ire was beginning to rise. It wasn't as though she and Sara were best buddies, but she did respect her as a fellow CSI.

"It's not like you've lost a friend Catherine."

"No, but the number 2 lab in the country, which, incidentally has been dropping, and with Sara – who happens to have one of the highest solve rates – gone, the labs reputation will drop even further. If Gil leaves – and he probably will – because of this, the ranking, and reputation will be in free-fall. For such a politically savvy guy, you sure screwed the pooch on this one. I doubt that Sheriff Atwater will be too impressed with your reasoning."

The smile fell from his face as the implications of what he'd done hit him. Catherine left Ecklie to stew on his decision.

Paging Warrick and Nick to meet her in the break-room, she met them on the way there, and they entered together. Warrick looked at Nick and they both looked at Catherine. "Before you hear it from any rumour mill, as of this morning, Sara's no longer working a the lab."

Both men were dumbfounded. It was almost a full five minutes before Nick spoke. "You're kidding right?"

Catherine shook her head. "Not kidding. Ecklie's already employed her replacement."

Warrick was the first to voice the other consideration. "How's Grissom taking it?"

"He seemed fine when he announced it."

Nick snorted, "Yeah, right. I highly doubt that he's really okay with it."

"I don't know man," Warrick said. "Have you seen him with Sophia lately? He looks pretty into her. He even asked her out for dinner."

Listening to the speculations the guy's were throwing around, Catherine thought she had a pretty good idea why Sara had left. Her leaving would have a negative impact on the lab, aside from the obvious connection to Grissom, most of the lab thought highly of her.

Grissom was in his darkened office; the shock of Sara's resignation had bought on a migraine of unusually intense proportions. He didn't dare drive home, knowing that the sunlight and noise of traffic would worsen the pain in his head to the point where he'd collapse from the pain.

There was a light knock at his door. "Come."

"Hey Gil, was just bringing you the case update on…" Finally seeing the agonised look on his face, she asked, "Are you okay?"

Almost moaning he said, "Not really. Migraine."

Backing out slowly the blonde said, "Oh, then I'll leave you. Hope you feel better soon."

Barely able to get the words out, Grissom stopped her. "No, could you please drive me home."

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	2. Chapter 2

DISCLAIMER – Not mine. Belong to Anthony Zuiker, et al, CBS and Alliance Atlantis.

A/N – One more chapter of this story (maybe more). The next update will be Hopelessly Devoted - a separate Sara vignette, that should be posted in the next few days.

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In the weeks since Sara's resignation, Grissom had become morose. Increasingly being filled with doubt, self-loathing and recrimination. Never the most accessible of people, he'd now withdrawn to the point where unless he was dealing directly with a case, he spoke to no one.

There was no time in his life that he could remember feeling worse. Thoughts of Sara occupied his mind constantly. At crime scenes it was all he could do to concentrate on the case. At the office piles of paperwork were growing exponentially.

Catherine had tried repeatedly to talk to him. Everyone knew what the problem was, and if would only be a matter of time before Ecklie would call her on the fact that her signature was on Grissom's reports, not his.

The new guy that had come from Colorado, Kyle Maxwell had turned out to be and absolute asshole. Surprisingly it was Sophia who stepped in to do something, about the plummeting morale at the lab.

Stepping into her former boss's office without him noticing, she waited till the prickly feel that someone's watching you, alerted him to her presence.

There was only a slight reaction of surprise when he looked up to see his former subordinate. Having his attention, she closed the door and sat down.

Without preamble she said, "Where did Sara go?"

Ecklie tried to stare her down, but she didn't falter. He pretended to finished checking some paperwork before acknowledging her with an answer. "I'm sorry Miss Curtis, but you have no right to ask that question."

"Bullshit Conrad. You screwed me over by sending me to nightshift, and I've learned to live with it. As it turns out, the nightshift crew really is a hell of a lot better than the dayshift, especially when you were the supervisor. Gil Grissom is the best teacher anyone could wish for, and he's a hell of a leader. You know you screwed him over when you let Sara Sidle go. You KNEW they had SOMETHING. Wether or not they were in a romantic, sexually relationship it doesn't matter, because if you don't bring her back he will leave, and you'll have lost the ONLY asset this lab has. You'll be able to forget any more grants, and the spotlight will never be on this lab again. Sure you've got some great, top level CSI's, but the new guy is bringing everyone down.

I thought I could provide come of the support that Sara obviously gave Grissom, but I'm not her. So either you tell me where she is, so I can at least give Gil some piece of mind, or you call her and ask her to come back to the lab!" Having finished saying her piece she sat back and waited for the lab director's reply.

His voice was calm and ice cold. "Firstly Miss Curtis, I WILL NOT be talked to that way in my own office. I am very aware of the situation, and you overestimate the influence of both Miss Sidle and Dr Grissom on this lab. The disruption caused by the two of them and whatever relationship they have, has ALREADY been a detriment. I sincerely doubt that Miss Sidle's return would change that fact. Your concern has been duly noted and dismissed. Thank you for your observations and input. Good day Miss Curtis."

Taking a deep breath to calm herself, Sofia left Ecklie's office. She knew he could have fired her for the outburst and what she was about to do next, but she also knew that he didn't have the balls to do anything to her after shafting her out of the Swing-shift Supervisor position.

Her next stop was to Sheriff Atwater. Even if the rumours of his neutral relationship with Grissom were true, surely he could see that Gil Grissom was an asset they couldn't afford to loose.

A solitary figure sat in the bleachers of an empty ice rink. The Zamboni had finished smoothing out the ice almost an hour ago, but Grissom's mind was still focused on the moment years ago when he'd been sitting with Sara. One minute he'd been talking about baseball, telling her that he thought it was a beautiful game. The answer to her 'Since when are you interested in beauty?' had fallen from his lips without fore-thought or intent. "Since I met you."

He'd seen her shock out of the corner of his eye, and casually stated that they go search the ice for clues. He left quickly not trusting himself to say anything else for fear that he'd blurt out more than that.

Everything since then had been a push me, pull you game that had wounded both of them. He thought nothing could have been worse than when he'd found out she'd been dating the paramedic, Hank Pedigrew, he was wrong. He never would have believed that it would ache so badly to have her out of his life.

The truth was though that he'd never actually believed she would. He'd trusted that she was smitten enough with him to remain unhappy, despondent, and lonely in Las Vegas. Yes it was chauvinism at its worst. What had made him think that a bright, beautiful woman like Sara would be satisfied with the pseudo relationship he was offering?

He could have looked for her. Being a brilliant investigator it would have taken him a matter of hours if that. But it seemed pitiful, as pitiful as the thought that she'd stay in Las Vegas and be unhappy for him. As much as his pride was keeping him from pursuing her, the gapping hole in his heart was causing him to waver.

Across town, Sophia had finished talking to Sheriff Atwater, and the smile on her face could have lit the entire Strip for a week. She then did something she never thought she'd do, she called Catherine.

Ten minutes later she sent a simple text message to Grissom's cell phone – SS 6125552370. Grissom who'd reluctantly returned to his town house checked the message that lit up the screen. He put his cell phone down and slowly picked up his land-line handset. He punched in the numbers and waited as call went through.


End file.
